Update on Aggression

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Squ'meytoo old to eat- any more KD

Barked: Sun Aug 19, '12 8:33am PST

Some of you know that I have been working with Squ'mey and his random dog aggression. I thought I would provide an update on how he's doing.
Some folks subscribe to the "all aggression is fear based" theory. But Squam was definitely not scared..he was cocky, confident, & meaning to follow through on the threats he was making. I started a thread in B&T, long, long ago, asking if there was a different way to deal with it. I was not impressed with much of the advice. Most of it insisted I was reading it wrong, and that it truly was fear.
"Look at that" was useless..he looked at that, fixated on that, & flew over threshold immediately. Sit & treat while the dog passed? Not a hopeWhat we did was working in quick direction changes while he was under threshold..total avoidance of his triggers. Rewarding for focus, and maintaing movement.
It has been a long road. But, in the last 2 weeks we have seen amazing results. He has been able to pass within 10 feet of calm, leashed dogs. He has been able to totally ignore fence lungers. And, on Friday, he was able to wait at a crosswalk with another dog with no reaction at all.He will never be a dog park dog, but that's ok. I am so proud of him (& myself) for sticking with it...for over a year...to get to a point where walks are once again, a pleasant experience.
Our next step will be passing by lungy-yappers...but that is a ways off. I need him to solidify the feeling of success before throwing that at him.
So take heart if you're struggling with a training issue. Things do get better..when you work hard & don't give up.